When President Biden said “I intend to be the most pro-union president leading the most pro-union administration in American history”, he set some pretty high expectations for himself. While it was exciting rhetoric, most did not really expect much, and they were mostly right. However, one area in which Biden has been a clear improvement over his predecessors is in his pro-labor appointments to the National Labor Relations Board, which has shifted the balance not just to a democratic majority on the board, but a genuinely pro-labor majority, one which has proved useful in the organizing wave of the last year.
Thanks to that new pro-labor majority, the NLRB officially filed a complaint against Starbucks last week, stating their practice of expanding wages and benefits only to non-unionized employees was illegal. The complaint follows a particularly spurious claim by Howard Schultz that because all of the unionized stores are in the middle of collective bargaining, Starbucks cannot unilaterally change wages and benefits in those stores outside of the bargaining process. That implies that bargaining is happening in good faith, even though Starbucks is delaying that process as much as possible.
The NLRB complaint, which came from a field office, will be heard by an Administrative Law judge on October 25th. If Starbucks appeals the ruling, it will go to the full board for a final ruling. The result could have a major impact on unionization efforts at other corporations with many shops like Amazon, Trader Joe’s, and now Chipotle.
Having an NLRB that is favorable to workers has been an invaluable advantage, but like so much else about the current moment, we cannot expect it to last forever. Now is not the time to slow down. We will keep organizing, keep building, keep fighting to create a better world for working people.
Image: Newly unionized workers at Chipotle in Lansing, MI